On Monday, the Congressional Budget Office released its assessment of the American Health Care Act, the GOP replacement to Obamacare. The nonpartisan budget agency projected that under the Republican plan, 24 million people would lose insurance coverage by 2026.
Many outlets are leading their coverage of the CBO with that number. But not all.
FOX Business News, for example, went with the following:
CBO: #Healthcare bill would decrease budget deficit by $337B through 2026. #BREAKING pic.twitter.com/AceiOXJJ2F
— FOX Business (@FoxBusiness) March 13, 2017
The network is technically correct: The CBO report projected that the AHCA would lead to a $337 billion deficit reduction. Yet as Vox’s Sarah Kliff explains, this is mostly due to cuts to entitlement programs such as Medicaid:
AHCA would be a huge cut to Medicaid. CBO estimates it would reduce spending on the health program for low-income Americans by $880 billion over the next decade. This helps explain why AHCA would reduce the deficit: the bill is spending a lot less money on entitlement programs.
About five minutes later, the network tweeted coverage numbers. But it said that only 14 million would lose coverage, a number based on CBO estimates for 2018 and not the 24 million expected to lose coverage by 2026. Moreover, the accompanying video again led with deficit reduction numbers.
CBO: 14 million more people would be uninsured in 2018. Read more: https://t.co/IuLuEQ3KAd #BREAKING pic.twitter.com/dkeqkGdrL1
— FOX Business (@FoxBusiness) March 13, 2017
The Twitter handle for Fox Business News isn’t subtle. Its bio reads: “Capitalism lives here.” And as a recent article by the Daily Beast’s Andrew Kirell pointed out, following Trump’s election, the outlet has taken an ideological swing even further to the right. CNN Money reporter Tom Kludt observed that when Fox News host Shep Smith has shared critical reporting of Trump on air, viewers changed the channel to Fox Business News.
